The other morning, while he was making his lunch for the day, my husband mumbled something I couldn’t quite hear. “What was that, Love?” He said it again, “Something’s gotta give. Something’s gotta give in this day!”
My husband is a hospital chaplain and his days are usually filled with lots of surprise opportunities to give care to patients, families, and staff.
On this particular morning, though, there were so many things already lined up, he knew there would be no room available to absorb sudden opportunities for care. He didn’t even have time for the things on his list: a morgue viewing to organize, a vow renewal ceremony to plan, referrals he hadn’t been able to get to the day before, important rounds to attend, and a couple of staff meetings.
“Something’s gotta give.”
We say this about our days when our to-do lists are just too long. Something’s gotta give way or move aside or be taken on by someone else in order to accomplish everything.
We say this when a discussion about how to move forward in a personal relationship or in a congregation has come to an impasse. When no one is budging and all possibilities seem mutually exclusive. Something’s gotta give.
And I suppose we are also saying a version of this in this week of encouragement toward giving to the Reformed Journal. Someone’s gotta give.
Someone’s gotta give. . .in order to keep filling this delightful online space with all the things – predictably solid essays like healthy staff meetings, poetry that comes like a surprise opportunity for care, blogs that are thick and heavy with grief (like a morgue viewing) or that open up a thin space (like a wedding vow renewal ceremony before death).
Someone’s gotta give. . .in order to kindle conversations that help us find a way between and through and above and beneath the suffocating and exhausting impasses.
Maybe you’re a someone who has been giving faithfully to the Reformed Journal for years. Thank you. But maybe you’re a new someone who will give for the first time – a sizeable and surprising one-time gift through our But Wait. . .There’s More! opportunity, or possibly a monthly gift that blesses predictably and regularly – like a good, healthy staff meeting.
May we all experience give in our lives where we need give. In this Advent season, may the gift of Jesus bless us.
And may we all find ways to give to meaningful work and community.
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